Twitch Group Chat Now in Beta

Twitch has announced that the group chat feature has entered its beta phase. Twitch's channel chats have reached about 700,000 users a day. Any user who goes to a stream to view can take part in the channel's chat. This has allowed gamers to connect with broadcasters on a whole new level than merely being a spectator.

What's Different?

Group chat is a private chat. These invite-only chat rooms do not replace the current chat rooms. They will allow people to invite other users to take part in chat without a bunch of people around. For example, a channel could choose to open up a chatroom specifically for moderators so they can easily chat without all the viewers seeing what goes on behind the scenes. Users can create up to 10 chatrooms at a time.

When Do I Get Group Chat?

Currently, only people in the Twitch Partner Program and Turbo subscribers have access to the new group chat feature. Twitch intends on rolling out the new feature as it is fully tested. Twitch hopes to get these feature out to all users as soon as time permits. Twitch has not released a firm date for release.

Will I Get Group Chat on my Mobile Device or Console?

As of now, the group chat feature is web-based only. Whether consoles and mobile devices will get group chat remains unclear.

A video walk-through of the group chat feature is available on the Twitch website.